Jürgen Habermas: Eine Biographie

by Stefan Müller-Doohm

‘Jürgen Habermas’, wrote the American philosopher Ronald Dworkin on the occasion of the great European thinker’s eightieth birthday, ‘is not only the world’s most famous living philosopher. Even his fame is famous.’ Now, after many years of intensive research and in-depth conversations with contemporaries, colleagues and Habermas himself, Stefan Müller-Doohm presents the first comprehensive biography of one of the most important public intellectuals of our time. From his political and philosophical awakening in West Germany to the formative relationships with Adorno and Horkheimer, Müller-Doohm masterfully traces the major forces that shaped Habermas’s intellectual development. He shows how Habermas’s life and work were conditioned by the possibilities offered to his generation in the unique circumstances of regained freedom that characterized postwar Germany. And yet Habermas’s career is fascinating precisely because it amounts to more than a corpus of scholarly work, however original and influential that may be. For here is someone who continually left the protective space of the university in order to assume the role of a participant in controversial public debates Ð from the significance of the Holocaust to the future of Europe Ð and in this way sought to influence the development of social and political life in an arena much broader than the academy. The significance and virtuosity of Habermas’s many writings over the years are also fully and expertly documented, ranging from his early work on the public sphere to his more recent writings on communicative action, cosmopolitanism and the postnational condition. What emerges from this biography is a vivid portrait of one of the great public intellectuals of our time Ð a unique thinker who has made an immense and lasting philosophical contribution but who, when he perceives that society is not living up to its potential for creating free and just conditions for all, becomes one of its most rigorous and persistent critics.

Genres: Biography, Philosophy, Sociology

919 pages, Kindle Edition

First published June 16, 2014

Reviews

[Turbulent_Architect · Rating 3 out of 5]

Habermas once quipped that "in general the life of a philosopher is rather poor in external events.” Well, that quote might as well have been the book's epigraph. Sure, his life contained some interesting episodes. His involvement with the student riots of the 1960s stands out here. But for the most part, his Müller-Doohm's biography of him reads like a list of academic achievements: Of degrees, publications, appointments, grants, awards, speeches, conferences, debates, and editorials. To give credit where credit is due, the book is staggeringly well researched. But it gives us very little insight into Habermas himself. Whatever insight it does give is into his qualities as an intellectual, with only fleeting glances at Habermas the man.

[Justin Evans · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jürgen Habermas is one of the most prolific authors of the last hundred years, and has just recently added a two-volume history of western philosophy to his tally. It is a shame that Stefan Müller-Doohm’s biography was published before Habermas’s Auch Eine Geschichte der Philosophie, but such is Habermas’ productivity that any book written about him is likely to be slightly outdated by its publication. Indeed, he may well have published another book by the time we get half-way through this review.

Müller-Doohm’s biography will remain valuable regardless. He brings to the task great skill as an historian of critical theory and as a writer: he studied with Adorno and Horkheimer and wrote a biography of the former. Müller-Doohm’s Habermas is well organized and clear, as well as extremely well researched. Müller-Doohm does not offer full or extensive analyses of Habermas’ ideas, but that is not the task of a biography, which should put those ideas in historical and personal context. At this, Müller-Doohm succeeds admirably. Habermas appears here in the lights of post-war German history, of his own extensive, idiosyncratic philosophical reading, and of the professional structures that he navigates so successfully.

See the full review here: https://marxandphilosophy.org.uk/revi...